Bowazon Faith Vs Windforce

Hey All,

Need some advice on Bowazon. Had some spare Wealth this ladder (never had spare Wealth before) so wanted to try a new build- still levelling at about level 73 now.

Switched to Faith in GMB at level 65 and wow, got so much more powerful than Buriza I was using before that.

Was pretty excited to get to level 73 to use

Windforce and give an Act 1 Merc my Faith so I still get

Fanaticism (level 14).

However, it is significantly worse than Faith.

My attack rating drops from 7,000 with fait to 2,000, lost "Ignores Target Defense" and damage only went up slightly. So now I don't hit as much and barely gained any attack,

What am I missing? I thought

Windforce was BIS.

Am I doing something wrong or should I just keep Faith and get an Act 2 Might merc and build a Pride?

My other gear is Fort, LoH,

Razortail, Cats Eye,

Raven Frost,

Silkweave. (still some improvement to be had there.

Thanks and appreciate any advice from Bowazon players out there...

Are you using

Strafe or Multishot? Also what

Helm?
I use a similar set up to what you are talking about here but I've got Gorerider and

Atma's Scarab. And when I'm bored I swap to a

Witchwild String for fun and for extra res, deadly strike, and more amp dmg.
When using

Windforce as primary (and merc using Faith) I use some

Blood Gloves with 2 pass and magic, 20IAS and 10 CB since it has built in Knockback.
I don't have any issues with hitting (I use

Strafe) and stuff seems to die pretty fast.

Thanks for reply

Want to use multishot primarily,

Used

Strafe when levelling as again multishot did not hit much but with Faith I was hitting everything and was more fun.

Just using tals

Mask now as dont have other leach.

Yeah

Strafe does seem to hit more but I'd ideally like to use either

Strafe or multishot...

Against Death knights, I seem to go from 74% change to hit to 54% so it is a big drop...

Multishot is so insanely mana hungry, I shy away for that reason.

Strafe hits very consistently. You need a way to deal with physical immune (amp dmg will work) and a decent amount of CB. Even 10% from gloves would make a big diff. Giantskull is also something to consider as a

Helm. You can use a BK ring for life leech since WF already has mana leech.

Ah, the age old discussion of Faith vs

Windforce.

@Schnorki, I summon thee
Might you provide some Insight?

Also, @RMac85, this has been discussed quite a bit in the past, so if you want, you can always read some old topics about it:
forums/bowazone-advice-t1504739.html
forums/wf-and-faith-120-45-vs-45-45-t1475631.html
forums/windforce-strafe-breakpoints-t1281614.html
forums/story-of-my-bowazon-t632904.html
forums/high-end-bowazon-questions-t869503.html

Fortitude

Laying of Hands

The Cat's Eye

Gore Rider

Tal Rasha's Horadric Crest

Giant Skull

Bul-Kathos' Wedding Band

ShadowHeart wrote: 2 weeks ago

[..]
@Schnorki, I summon thee
[..]

Figured at least one of my notifications this morning would relate to this when I saw the topic name..

First and foremost,

Windforce is about damage per hit, not speed. And you really want to play into that. As such, when going for actual overall performance, you don't want to use a Faith merc but go with the trusty ol' might/Pride and enjoy the massive dmg/shot that gives you. The same is true for the remainder of your gear: aim to hit 9 frame attacks (89 IAS) and then call it a day, don't blow more ED on trying to squeeze out any extra IAS after that point. Sure, you could hit the next

Strafe BP. And you could hit 8 frames in general without fana. Hell, you could go even further and hit the 157

Strafe BP as well if you really wanted to. But in a WF setup, it simply isn't worth it. Hit 89, focus on dmg/ED, done.

Ultimately, given ideal gear/build for each, WF and Faith are still very close to one another in overall performance with WF offering just slightly more DPS (and obv a ton more per-hit dmg) while Faith gives you the "joy of shooting faster" (largely subjective, but I totally get it). At the end of the day, they're so close that it is solely a matter of preference in style and 'hit like a truck' vs. 'shoot way faster'.

All that said, you're not in that situation. As per the OP, you just barely hit the minimum level for WF which - unlike many other items - scales (significantly) with level. 3.125 max/lvl is nothing to ignore and will def. eat into your overall performance if you're still at a lower level. Just comparing the min equip lvl to say lvl 90, you're looking at over 50 less max dmg on your weapon. For a bow, that's a ton.

The AR is gonna be a similar issue. Once you hit a solid enough lvl (skills, more dex, ...) that in and by itself drives up your AR and so will optimizing your gear. The ITD on Faith I would argue can largely be ignored, simply because it doesn't work on bosses and such, meaning either build still needs to get solid AR no matter what. What's far more impactful here is the 300% AR on Faith plus even more AR via the

Fanaticism aura as compared to...5 dex (lol) on WF. So yes, getting AR with WF is far more involved than with Faith but in either case, you're still a zon so it really isn't that hard. As a point of reference, my WF zon sits at nearly 18.5k AR with

Strafe and well over 12k with multi. Takes a bit to get that far but once you close in on those levels, you're really not missing the Faith AR anymore as you're at 95% hit vs. nearly everything anyways.
Though beyond AR, keep in mind that your lvl vs. monster lvl also has a (significant) impact on hit chance. That, too will be solved automatically once you level up some more.

So if we only need 9fpa for WF, I’m guessing we won’t need a 120/45

Helm, as that is very unobtainable for me.

Would a 3os

Helm with random ED jewels and one 15ias work, or is there a better

Helm one would suggest? I have a couple of 40 ED jewels I can use.

Atomicharmony24 wrote: 2 weeks ago

So if we only need 9fpa for WF, I’m guessing we won’t need a 120/45

Helm, as that is very unobtainable for me.

Would a 3os

Helm with random ED jewels and one 15ias work, or is there a better

Helm one would suggest? I have a couple of 40 ED jewels I can use.

I put an IAS/min dmg jewel in my WF and use g-face with an ED/dex jewel.

I found

Windforce really starts to beat out Faith once you're past level 90.

Disclaimer, I am a multishot speed person. So I quite like the extra speed from Faith and when I switched to Winfdorce I had to shove as many 15/40 jewels as I could in.

Stick with Faith on your Bowazon as it boosts attack speed, rating, and consistency. Pair it with an Act 2 Might merc holding Pride for more damage.

Windforce is powerful but lacks Faith's consistency and "Ignore Target's Defense". This setup should improve your overall DPS and gameplay.

ShadowHeart wrote: 2 weeks ago

Ah, the age old discussion of Faith vs

Windforce.

@Schnorki, I summon thee
Might you provide some Insight?

Also, @RMac85, this has been discussed quite a bit in the past, so if you want, you can always read some old topics about it:
forums/bowazone-advice-t1504739.html
forums/wf-and-faith-120-45-vs-45-45-t1475631.html
forums/windforce-strafe-breakpoints-t1281614.html
forums/story-of-my-bowazon-t632904.html
forums/high-end-bowazon-questions-t869503.html

Thanks for the links, some good reading there!

Schnorki wrote: 2 weeks ago

ShadowHeart wrote: 2 weeks ago

[..]
@Schnorki, I summon thee
[..]

Figured at least one of my notifications this morning would relate to this when I saw the topic name..

First and foremost,

Windforce is about damage per hit, not speed. And you really want to play into that. As such, when going for actual overall performance, you don't want to use a Faith merc but go with the trusty ol' might/Pride and enjoy the massive dmg/shot that gives you. The same is true for the remainder of your gear: aim to hit 9 frame attacks (89 IAS) and then call it a day, don't blow more ED on trying to squeeze out any extra IAS after that point. Sure, you could hit the next

Strafe BP. And you could hit 8 frames in general without fana. Hell, you could go even further and hit the 157

Strafe BP as well if you really wanted to. But in a WF setup, it simply isn't worth it. Hit 89, focus on dmg/ED, done.

Ultimately, given ideal gear/build for each, WF and Faith are still very close to one another in overall performance with WF offering just slightly more DPS (and obv a ton more per-hit dmg) while Faith gives you the "joy of shooting faster" (largely subjective, but I totally get it). At the end of the day, they're so close that it is solely a matter of preference in style and 'hit like a truck' vs. 'shoot way faster'.

All that said, you're not in that situation. As per the OP, you just barely hit the minimum level for WF which - unlike many other items - scales (significantly) with level. 3.125 max/lvl is nothing to ignore and will def. eat into your overall performance if you're still at a lower level. Just comparing the min equip lvl to say lvl 90, you're looking at over 50 less max dmg on your weapon. For a bow, that's a ton.

The AR is gonna be a similar issue. Once you hit a solid enough lvl (skills, more dex, ...) that in and by itself drives up your AR and so will optimizing your gear. The ITD on Faith I would argue can largely be ignored, simply because it doesn't work on bosses and such, meaning either build still needs to get solid AR no matter what. What's far more impactful here is the 300% AR on Faith plus even more AR via the

Fanaticism aura as compared to...5 dex (lol) on WF. So yes, getting AR with WF is far more involved than with Faith but in either case, you're still a zon so it really isn't that hard. As a point of reference, my WF zon sits at nearly 18.5k AR with

Strafe and well over 12k with multi. Takes a bit to get that far but once you close in on those levels, you're really not missing the Faith AR anymore as you're at 95% hit vs. nearly everything anyways.
Though beyond AR, keep in mind that your lvl vs. monster lvl also has a (significant) impact on hit chance. That, too will be solved automatically once you level up some more.

Thanks for the detailed reply, sounds like i need to build/ buy a Pride anyway so might do that and stick with Faith for a while, then try

Windforce again when I've levelled a bit more.

RMac85 wrote: 2 weeks ago

Hey All,

Need some advice on Bowazon. Had some spare Wealth this ladder (never had spare Wealth before) so wanted to try a new build- still levelling at about level 73 now.

Switched to Faith in GMB at level 65 and wow, got so much more powerful than Buriza I was using before that.

Was pretty excited to get to level 73 to use

Windforce and give an Act 1 Merc my Faith so I still get

Fanaticism (level 14).

However, it is significantly worse than Faith.

My attack rating drops from 7,000 with fait to 2,000, lost "Ignores Target Defense" and damage only went up slightly. So now I don't hit as much and barely gained any attack,

What am I missing? I thought

Windforce was BIS.

Am I doing something wrong or should I just keep Faith and get an Act 2 Might merc and build a Pride?

My other gear is Fort, LoH,

Razortail, Cats Eye,

Raven Frost,

Silkweave. (still some improvement to be had there.

Thanks and appreciate any advice from Bowazon players out there...

My build is like this:

https://maxroll.gg/d2/d2planner/zmlw0uez

You can change the merc into act 2 Might merc with Pride but I like act 1 merc an mostly play solo so one shot everything.